


i'm a little bit love drunk

by kathillards



Category: Power Rangers, Power Rangers Dino Charge
Genre: F/M, Living Together AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-19
Updated: 2016-03-19
Packaged: 2018-05-27 15:31:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6289987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kathillards/pseuds/kathillards
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s not her fault – he is very handsome. And tall. Incredibly, ridiculously tall. She only comes up to his chin in her high heels, which doesn’t help much since he’s staying at her house. In hindsight, that was probably her first mistake. —- IvanKendall</p>
            </blockquote>





	i'm a little bit love drunk

**Author's Note:**

> is it really an au if the show never specifies where ivan lives??
> 
> this is a hard t-rating, kids, not enough to be mature but definitely sexual content, so watch out.

If there’s one thing Ivan’s good at, Kendall has discovered it’s his remarkable ability to somehow always, usually unintentionally, but fairly consistently make her blush.

It’s not like he _tries_. And it’s not like she’s an easy person to fluster in the first place. At least, she strives not to be – she has a museum to run and a planet to save, which leaves little to no time left over for handsome knights who make her laugh. She hasn’t had a serious relationship in years because the mere idea of going through the dating motions with anybody exhausts her.

And yet, here she is. It’s not her fault – he is _very_ handsome. And tall. Incredibly, ridiculously tall. She only comes up to his chin in her high heels, which doesn’t help much since he’s staying at her house and she normally doesn’t wear shoes inside her own apartment.

In hindsight, that was probably her first mistake.

-:-

She realizes a little too late that letting Ivan live with her, since he has nowhere else to go, is maybe not the best idea for any rational part of her body. The _rational_ part of her would have suggested having him stay with Chase, or Tyler, or even Shelby; anyone else but her, because she’s his boss and his teammate and he is stupidly tall and good-looking and off-limits.

The irrational part is somehow always the one that ends up at the forefront of her brain when she steps out of her room in the morning to find him leaving the bathroom in a towel.

“Morning,” he says cheerfully, and she kind of wants to hit him, even though she can’t really blame him. She’s the one who told him to make himself at home. And she’s definitely the one who needs to stop staring. Objectifying your employees, no matter how pretty they are, is generally frowned upon in any establishment.

“Good morning,” she manages, staring down at her feet. She doesn’t have her heels on yet. That’s a problem. He’s about a foot taller than her, which makes conversing with him difficult at best and impossible at worst. She has yet to figure out a way to look him in the eye without melting into his arms.

And he does have great arms.

-:-

“Do you normally stay up so late for work?”

He poses the question half in concern, half in curiosity, when she pads down to the kitchen one night, well past his usual bedtime, to find him making what looks like a midnight snack of sandwiches. Kendall hops up onto a stool at her kitchen counter, watching as he tops the pile of vegetables with avocado. Her stomach grumbles traitorously, ignoring the fact that she’d come out of her room solely to check on him, not to eat for herself.

“Somebody has to,” she says dryly, reaching for her landline to check her voicemails for the day, just in case. Nobody calls her on the landline except her grandparents and telemarketers, but she figures it doesn’t hurt to be thorough. And it gives her something to do besides just staring at him.

“I don’t think the museum would be too wounded if you maybe went to bed before midnight,” Ivan suggests, cutting the sandwich neatly in two. He’s gotten quite good at making food since he started working at the café, she notes absently, not that she’s staring at him.

“You never know,” Kendall snorts. Unladylike, her mother would say, but Ivan only smiles at her. “I could stop making sure everything is running smoothly for two seconds, and the next thing you know, Sledge is back and he has all our energems and Chase’s entire collection of baseball caps.”

“Woe be to the world,” Ivan agrees, grinning at her, and slides her a plate she had somehow missed him making that hosts half the sandwiches he’s made. “If you’re going to be awake, you should at least have some energy.”

Kendall blinks at him. “I wasn’t – I’m not hungry.” Her stomach betrays her again and Ivan raises an eyebrow. She hates how expressive his face is, sometimes; nobody should be allowed to look that good while being so open with their emotions. “What’s in this?”

Ivan shrugs, taking a bite of his own half. “Shelby calls it a Greek salad sandwich. I know you like olives, so I added some extra in there.”

She stares at him. “You – ” He made this for her. That puts a wrench in her plans. She hadn’t wanted to spend too much time with him tonight, or any night, but the way he’s smiling at her makes her cheeks turn that shade of pink that always means trouble, when it’s around him. She tends to lose her inhibitions at a certain point in the night, anyway, although she usually needs alcohol to get to that point instead of just Ivan’s smile.

“Do you like it?” he asks hopefully when she takes a bite. Kendall wishes her insides wouldn’t unfurl and tangle up the way they do when he looks at her that way – all eyelashes and dimples and, wow, it must be getting really late for her to be staring at his tongue when he runs it over his lips.

She has better self-control than that. Most of the time. “It’s great,” she says, which is a lie. It’s her favorite sandwich. She kind of hates Shelby for teaching him how to make it.

-:-

Ivan is very good about keeping out of her way when they’re at home; maybe out of misplaced guilt that she’s putting him up, or maybe just because of his knight-bred manners on living in the same house as a woman he’s not involved with, but either way, aside from the one or two or maybe three completely accidental times she sees him shirtless, he’s the perfect housemate.

She notices that change the first time she brings someone home, though.

It’s nothing, really – barely even a date. Mostly professional. Entirely innocent. But when Tyler drops him off that afternoon after his shift and he comes in to see her sitting in the living room, laughing at some stupid joke, she can see the way his gaze jumps between the two of them, brow furrowing, fingers curling in on his coat draped over his arms.

She’s not _trying_ to pay so much attention to him, but he’s just kind of there, and a much more welcome sight than – Liam, Luke, whatever his name is. Her mother had set them up, anyway, so it’s not like she’s obligated to care about his feelings or remember his name.

“Ivan,” she says, partly in greeting, partly in surprise. For some reason, she’d expected him to come home later, at a time when she’d be free of this date and not have to deal with this. There’s no logical reason for expecting that, since she’s the one who schedules his shifts, but her brain startles at seeing him in the doorway, anyway.

“Miss Morgan,” he replies, inclining his head. Picture-perfect professionalism. She doesn’t know how he makes it look so easy, when she turns the color of Tyler’s suit every time she sees him half-naked. “Don’t let me interrupt.”

“Oh, no, I – ” Liam, his name was Liam. Hopefully. “Liam, this is my – my roommate, Ivan. Ivan, this is Liam, he’s – ” Her brain supplies her only with question marks as she stares up into Ivan’s politely inquiring face. “He’s a friend of the family?” It’s not supposed to be a question.

“Pleasure to meet you,” Ivan says, and Liam says something in reply that she tunes out entirely, too focused on the way Ivan looks between him and her, like he can sense every inch of distance between their bodies on the couch, the way his gaze lingers on the hemline of her dress – a little too high to be entirely professional, and he’s smart enough to know the difference between her work skirts and her everyday going-out skirts.

She adjusts her legs, uncrossing them, sliding the hem lower, her face warming, but Ivan shoots her one last glance over his shoulder before he disappears down the hallway to his room. She hears the shower running a little while later, and that’s about the end of the date right there.

-:-

The next time it happens, about two months later, she is somehow even less prepared, which is, of course, only reasonable when he opens her door on a Saturday morning to ask her about breakfast and finds her wearing only her bed sheets, her one-night stand getting dressed in front of the mirror.

She maybe could have planned this better, but in her defense, a monster attack of last week’s magnitude deserved a weekend of getting truly, properly drunk. Not that she thinks Ivan would agree.

“My apologies,” he says slowly, head swiveling between her and – she can’t remember this one’s name, either. At least this time she has the excuse of a hangover. “I just – I’ll be in the kitchen.”

The sheets don’t cover much, though thankfully enough. By the time Kendall gets her legs underneath them, Ivan has closed the door with a quiet click, leaving her fumbling with a reply into the silence.

Her one night stand looks at her in curiosity. “Not your boyfriend?”

Kendall sighs, rubbing a hand over her face. “It’s complicated.”

-:-

What’s complicated about it is that he makes her favorite sandwiches without being told and he makes her laugh and he saves her life and listens to her talk about science for hours and, all in all, is concievably the best possible roommate one could ask for if they had to room with a medieval knight.

What’s _complicated_ is that as much as he flirts with her, he never crosses the line, and there is a line, and he works for her, is where the line is. She’s pretty sure that morning is the first time he’s even seen her with less than all her clothes on, which is fairly remarkable, considering her own, much worse track record with him.

He doesn’t mention it when she walks downstairs in reasonably decent clothes, only offering her a steaming hot plate of what looks like the most delicious French toast she’s ever seen. “Cinnamon and plums,” he says simply, gesturing to the fruit drizzling juice all over the toast. “New recipe.”

“Thank you,” she says, sitting down at the counter. Her legs still feel awfully bare in her shorts when she swings them over the stool, like she can still feel his gaze burning a hole there, even though he’s pretty much looking anywhere else but at her. “And I’m sorry for – ”

Ivan shakes his head quickly. “No, no, don’t worry about it. My fault, I should have – I should have knocked.”

Still not looking at her. Kendall stabs at her French toast, figuring she deserves it. She’s his boss. There’s no way for him to see her naked and not have it be awkward. The silence stretches just long enough to become tense, but she resists breaking it, wanting to give him space even though he’s only five feet across from her, fixing his own breakfast.

She wishes he wouldn’t make her special breakfasts. She loves plums. She loves his cooking. It makes it difficult to draw lines where they should be.

He ends up getting sick of the silence first, looking up from his scrambled eggs to ask, “How is it?”

“Delicious,” she says instantly, already half-done with her French toast. “Of course, you made it.”

If she’s not mistaken, he’s smiling when he ducks his head back down over the stove. “You’re too good for my ego, my lady,” he says, almost back to normal, if flirting counts as normal. And it does, because she enjoys it maybe too much. “Will your companion be joining us?”

Her eyes widen. “No, no, um,” _god_ , why did he have to ask that? It’s too early in the morning for her to be this flustered over him. “No, that’s not – no,” she concludes weakly. “Just us.”

“Ah,” Ivan says, completely noncommital, and serves his scrambled eggs into a bowl before joining her on the opposite side of the corner. “So, it’s not like – you two aren’t – ”

At least she’s not the only one stumbling over her words. He’s normally so eloquent, she almost smiles seeing him like this. Then again, that’s probably what the universe thinks about her, which would explain the disaster of that morning. “Not at all,” she says hastily. “No, it was just – just that – I was drunk.”

She cringes as she says it, hating herself a little for the godawful cliché excuse, but Ivan only nods and looks down at his eggs. Kendall stares at him for a moment, trying to puzzle out his reaction, but there’s no judgment or disdain or any other sort of emotion at all.

Finally, she gives in to the pressure of the conversational lull and blurts out, “I’m sorry you had to see that. I – I should have locked the door – probably.”

Ivan lifts his head to look at her, face indecipherable, and then his lips curl in a smile. “You’re acting like it was a traumatic experience,” he points out, and she stops eating to stare at him in confusion. He leans over the counter like he’s telling her a secret and says, “It wasn’t completely scarring.”

His gaze drops almost pointedly but most likely unintentionally to her chest, where her t-shirt covers up all of what she knows he saw earlier – she had clutched the sheets to preserve her modesty, but it had definitely been far more skin than he’s used to her showing – and she feels like maybe the floor could swallow her up and it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world.

Before she can come up with a decent reply, Ivan is backing away, a grin on his face as he turns his attention back to his eggs. Kendall feels a sharp urge to stab him with her fork; he has no business flirting with her like that after _that_. It’s not like _she_ ever brings up how often she’s seen him shirtless at inopportune times, or _ever_.

“Well, I’m glad you weren’t totally traumatized,” she retorts, which is weak, she knows, but she puts enough huff into her voice to make up for the lack of originality. “I would hate for _you_ to feel awkward after seeing _me_ naked.”

Ivan looks briefly worried. “I didn’t see you – ”

Kendall points her fork at him. “Eat your eggs.” He grins and ducks his head back down. For a second, she feels warm at the notion that he hadn’t entirely hated what he saw, but she battles it down.

Lines. She needs to get better at drawing them.

-:-

 Despite his flirting, she knows he’s avoiding her in his own way, because he maybe doesn’t touch her as casually and as much as he used to, or stand so close behind her she can feel his body heat at her back, or catch her eye and smile when they’re in the lab together. She doesn’t mind, much, because it’s complicated and she can’t blame him but it’s not her favorite feeling in the world.

In fact, the next time he actually, properly touches her, it’s to carry her after she’s been knocked unconscious.

She wakes up from a monster attack in his arms in the backseat of Tyler’s truck, just the two of them and Tyler and Shelby in the front of the car. Her memory is fuzzy, but she remembers being struck, something burning on her skin, and being hit hard enough to knock her head against the cement road when she fell and forcibly demorphed.

“Ivan?” she coughs out, her vision still a little hazy around the edges. She can make out his face though, the lines of concern furrowing his brow as he looks down at her, can feel his hand on her leg, steadying her, and the other behind her head, cradling it gently.

“Miss Morgan,” he breathes, and she still doesn’t know how he makes such a formal title sound so intimate when it comes from his lips. “You’re awake.”

“How are you feeling, Miss Morgan?” Shelby asks from the front seat. Kendall can’t twist to see her, but it’s not like she was planning on looking away from Ivan any time soon, anyway.

“I’m – ” Kendall coughs again, this time blood. “I’m fine?”

Ivan removes the hand behind her head to get her a tissue. “You’re not _fine_ ,” he says firmly, his hand shaking a little when he presses the tissue to her mouth. “You’re _bleeding_. And that fire attack – it struck you right on your spine. We have to take you to a hospital – ”

“No,” she says quickly; there’s no way she needs a monster attack on her hospital records. “No, take me home. I have enough first-aid supplies there.”

“What about the base?” Tyler asks, shifting lanes obediently. “We have a first-aid kit there, right?”

“I have more at my house,” she says, pulling the tissue away to analyze the blood on it. Ivan’s hand on her leg shifts; it takes her a moment to remember she’s wearing a skirt and he’s touching bare skin and now is definitely not the time to be focusing on how warm his touch is.

She squirms. It doesn’t help much with the burn on her back, but his fingers are distracting enough that she hardly even notices the pain. His hand stills at her movement, but he doesn’t remove it.

“Ivan,” she manages to get out, “you can apply first aid if I guide you, right?”

Shelby turns around again to ask, “Are you sure you don’t need me to help?”

“No, you need to get to the lab and – ” Kendall pauses to cough again; Ivan’s other hand finds her hair and strokes it gently. If she weren’t in so much pain, she thinks she would have melted into the car seat by now. “You need to get that new dino charger working before that monster comes back.”

“I can handle it,” Ivan assures her, or maybe he’s talking to Shelby, she’s not quite sure before her vision clouds over again.

-:-

It occurs to her that she maybe should have thought this whole letting Ivan give her first aid thing through a little more. At least, if she had considered it properly, she might have realized that it requires being topless around him and having him touch her and being alone with him and being _half-naked and alone with him_.

In her defense, she had been pretty woozy from the attack.

Ivan’s fingers are unerringly soft and cautious on her back, though it doesn’t stop Kendall shivering every time he applies the burn salve. Maybe it’s from the air conditioner of her apartment; after all, she’s naked from the waist up and her skin is crawling with goosebumps, it’s only natural that she’s cold.

On the other hand, she’s naked and he’s touching her and it actually feels way too hot in the room for having the air conditioner on full blast.

She glances over her shoulder to watch him work, although he’s determinedly not looking anywhere but at her back. “Almost done?” she asks, trying to keep her voice light, but her breath catches when he spreads the salve sideways, fingers running carefully but too close to the side of her breast. Her arms around her chest tighten reflexively; she knows he wouldn’t actually touch anything, but the problem is that maybe she wants him to.

“I do believe so,” he says, pulling back. Instantly, the lack of his touch leaves her cold, although he stays close enough that her body vascillates between heat and chill with every movement. “Were you hurt anywhere else?”

“Just my head,” she says with a sigh, reaching for her bra. Her arms have to loosen for it, and when she chances a glance at him, he’s looking away. Quickly. Something flutters inside her as she hooks her bra on, probably the same part of her that is stupidly glad she’d been wearing a fairly nice bra instead of one of her old, more comfortable ones today.

Not that this one isn’t comfortable. He hands over her shirt with his gaze fixed determinedly on some point beyond her head, but she doesn’t think she’s imagining the way his eyes jump to her chest, the purple satin cupping her breasts, down to the expanse of bare skin between her bra and her skirt – she tugs her shirt on, and by the time she surfaces, he’s definitely not looking at her anymore.

“I’ll get you some water,” he says, rising from the couch. Kendall reacts without thinking, catching his wrist before he can leave, and even though pain lances through her arm hard enough to make her hiss, she thinks the look on his face when she touches him is possibly worth it.

“Ivan,” she says, breathing slow to get the words out without them hurting too much. “Thank you.”

His face softens from impassivity to warmth, a smile playing on his lips that feels at once intimate and tender. “Of course,” he says, catching her hand and squeezing it. “You should get some rest.”

“Yeah,” she agrees, letting her hand drop and falling back into the couch cushions. By the time he brings her water, she’s out cold from the pain medicine, and by the time she wakes up, she has an extra blanket on top of her.

-:-

Things mostly go back to normal after that; he certainly never mentions almost practically seeing her topless ever again, and none of the other rangers bring it up, so he definitely hasn’t told them, not that she thought he would. Living with him is like trying to navigate a maze of sexual tension and too much shirtlessness, but she thinks she manages appropriately well.

At least until Shelby corners her at a booth in the café and says bluntly, “What’s going on between you and Ivan?”

Kendall stares at her, nonplussed. “Nothing?” Shelby looks the opposite of convinced, so she amends, “We live together?”

Shelby rolls her eyes. “I know _that_. Something _happened_ , didn’t it? Something’s changed, it’s different now, I can _tell_.” Kendall scoffs and looks back down at her work, but Shelby presses, “Did you see him naked or something?”

“Oh, my god,” Kendall mouths at her iPad.

“Did he see _you_ naked?” Shelby tries. Kendall has to bite the inside of her cheek to stop her face from giving her away, but Shelby pounces, anyway. “He _did_ , didn’t he? I knew it had to be when he took you home to take care of that awful burn on your back, and ever since, you guys have been dancing around each other – ”

“He did not, and we have not,” Kendall interrupts firmly, even though Shelby isn’t exactly wrong. “Are you just here to waste my time, because I actually have work to do – ”

Shelby plants her palm over Kendall’s screen so she can’t read her emails. “No, we have to talk about this, right now.”

Kendall frowns at her. “And why is that?”

Shelby hesitates for a moment. “Because he’s over there right now flirting with some random girl and I thought I should make sure that wasn’t going to be a problem.”

Kendall hates herself for looking, but she does it anyway. Ivan is leaning over the counter, grinning at a pretty, leggy blonde as she laughs at whatever he’s just said. Her stomach jumps, twists, and tangles up inside her. Plenty of girls have flirted with him before, and she knows he’s naturally kind and polite and emphatic, but – Shelby is right. Something feels different.

“It’s not,” she finally remembers to say, jerking her attention back to her iPad, now free of Shelby’s hand. She doesn’t acknowledge that she’d let the conversation pause too long, stared at Ivan for a minute too long, long enough that Shelby is now looking at her in concern. “Tell him to get back to work, though.”

Shelby raises an eyebrow. “That’s it? Really?”

Kendall sighs. “What do you want me to say?”

“I _want_ you to admit you have feelings for him,” Shelby says. Something inside Kendall jerks at the thought, at the idea of admitting it, admitting that she looks at him too long in all the wrong ways, that every time he touches her she gets goosebumps, that she wakes up a little later than usual most days now so he can make her breakfast because he always beams at her when she enjoys it.

“I don’t,” she says instead.

Shelby stares at her for a pregnant pause. “Why don’t you?”

“Why don’t I have feelings for him?” Kendall repeats, confused. “Because I – because I don’t.”

“You and I both know that’s a lie.”

Kendall makes a face at her. “ _Because_ , Shelby, even if I _did_ , he’s my _employee_ – ”

“You’re your own boss!” Shelby protests.

“I report to my superiors! Besides, any fraternization amongst employees is discouraged by the museum. _And_ that doesn’t even get into the fact that we’re _teammates_. It would jeopardize our whole mission.”

Shelby’s brow furrows. “Tyler and I manage,” she points out.

Kendall can’t resist remarking, “Because you and Tyler have the romantic relationship of kindergarteners.” She feels a little bad when Shelby’s jaw drops, but the girl Ivan is flirting with laughs loudly enough for her to remember she exists, and her mood sours enough that she doesn’t really regret it.

“ _Rude_ ,” Shelby huffs. “I’m trying to _help_ you.”

“I don’t need your help,” Kendall says, looking back down at her screen. “Isn’t your break over by now?”

“Kendall,” Shelby says, and doesn’t correct herself even when Kendall glares at her. “I’m telling you this as your _friend_. You need to do something, or it will drive you crazy _for-ever_. You don’t think having feelings for him without acting on it isn’t already jeopardizing the team? It’s _awkward_. You’re making things difficult for yourself. So do us all a favor and just jump his bones already.”

If there’s one thing Shelby’s good at it, it’s getting the last word.

-:-

In hindsight, she should have expected him to do this. She hadn’t really thought she could get away with avoiding him for weeks, but she _had_ thought her home was somewhat neutral ground. He hadn’t said anything, either, although she wondered if maybe Shelby had spoken to him, because that girl had shown up at the café a few times since, and she hadn’t seen Ivan properly flirting after that first time.

Of course, that isn’t what she’s thinking about it when he corners her at the kitchen island where she’s been eating a sandwich of her own making, much less delicious than the kind he makes for her.

“You’ve been avoiding me,” he states frankly, stopping right in front of where she’s sitting on her usual stool, swiveled around to face him when he’d entered, her half-finished sandwich forgotten on the counter behind her. His gaze sweeps over her as she struggles for a reply, and she wishes she had properly predicted this confrontation so she could have worn something other than shorts and a t-shirt. Her legs feel naked swinging between the two of them.

“I haven’t,” she begins, but it’s hard to lie when he’s staring at her like that – open and earnest and _hurt_ and, honestly, he has no right to look that handsome or to still be towering over her even when she’s up on a stool. “Ivan – ”

“Did I do something?” he asks, stepping closer, not enough to crowd her, but enough to make her feel pinned. Of course, it’s not like she could escape this conversation anyway; he’s blocking the door. “If I’ve upset you – ”

“No,” Kendall says quickly, her heartbeat accelerating traitorously at his proximity, but an image of him smiling at that girl from the café flashes through her mind, and she falters. “No, you… you haven’t.”

Ivan stares at her for a long, poignant pause, his gaze intense enough to make her toes curl. Her insides are a mess of anxiety and anticipation; she doesn’t know how to describe the sensation at all. He looks like he’s waiting for something, or like he’s trying to puzzle her out. She’s not sure which one she would prefer.

Finally, he leans closer and says, the words careful and deliberate, “Is this about the girl?”

Her eyes widen, stomach flipping. “What – no – ” Ivan raises an eyebrow, unconvinced. Kendall feels her cheeks flush. “Did Shelby talk to you?”

Ivan tilts his head. “She may have mentioned something,” he admits. There’s a note of amusement in his voice that only makes her face warmer. “Of course, I wasn’t sure why you would be jealous – ”

“I wasn’t,” Kendall says firmly, eyes locked on a spot in her living room beyond his shoulder.

Ivan clasps his hands behind his back, which should maybe give her more breathing room, but he’s standing several steps closer now than he was just a moment ago. He runs his tongue over his lips absentmindedly, but her mind is anything but absent when her eyes jump to the motion. Despite how tall he is, all she has to do to kiss him is lean up, just a little, it would be so easy –

“So, what’s the matter?” he asks, voice soft, head leaning forward. Kendall stares at his neck, which is in her direct line of view, and below it, where the top button of his shirt is undone for some incomprehensible reason.

She has to answer, or else she’ll start imagining opening the rest of his buttons. “I think – maybe – ” He’s staring at her lips, she knows he is, and she wants to make him stop but – she also doesn’t. “This whole… living together arrangement… might be – confusing.”

Ivan pauses, meeting her gaze, looking, for the first time, slightly unsure. “Confusing?” he repeats, cocking his head.

Kendall squirms on the stool, attempting to straighten up so she at least gains some height on him. It’s difficult with how piercing his eyes are. “You know, because we – we work together. And… and live together. And it’s – it’s confusing, because – because – we – ”

Her words falter, trail off into nothing, because his gaze keeps flickering to her lips, and her mouth feels dry, and she wants to lick her lips but that suddenly seems like a bad idea in light of how he’s looking at her, in light of how little she’s wearing, in light of how stupidly close he’s standing that she can hear him breathing, can count every eyelash, the angles of his jaw, the way he –

He steps back. “I would be happy to move out, Miss Morgan,” he says slowly, lowering his gaze down to the floor. “If that’s what you wish.”

Kendall opens her mouth, then closes it. He doesn’t have any decipherable emotion on his face when he looks up at her, but her stomach twists anyway. “That’s not what I – ” is halfway out of her mouth before she really knows what she’s saying.

Ivan raises an eyebrow. “That’s not what you want?” His voice rises with the question, almost hopeful. Her teeth dig into her bottom lip, a nervous habit she’d thought she’d broken years ago, but her heart is fluttering when his eyes crinkle a little at the edges, like he’s trying to hold in a smile, and maybe she’s not as jaded as she thought she was.

“No,” she admits, running her tongue over her lips, hands curling over the edge of her stool, far too breathless to still be speaking. His gaze darts down to her mouth again, unintentional but undeniable. Her cheeks warm. “I want – ”

He’s staring at her, too close again, waiting, expectant, like everything is hanging on her next word, but she can’t find it. So, instead, she does the only thing that seems rational and reaches up to cup his face and yank him downwards until his lips crash messily against hers and she’s kissing him, eager and wet and maybe a little sloppy but –

But he’s kissing her back, arms sliding around her to steady himself on the kitchen counter digging into her back, his body rocking forward until he’s pressed flush against her, right between her legs, tilting his head, opening his mouth – Kendall feels a little like she’s drowning, with her fingers curling around his neck and into his hair as if to hold on for balance. He backs her up further between the counter and his body, not that she minds the position, and settles one hand softly on the back of her head, cradling it as he kisses her, his fingers soft in her loose curls.

She knows she should probably stop, but he breaks it off first and she gasps from the sudden rush of air, her hand slipping so her nails dig into his collarbone, holding him there even though he’s making no move to pull away.

“I must say,” he muses, his breath tickling her cheeks as he leans his forehead against her, “if this is all you wanted, all you had to do was say so.”

Kendall flushes, dropping her other hand from his cheek like it’s on fire. “You know _what_ – ”

“I jest,” Ivan grins, warm and teasing, nudging his head forward to press a kiss to the corner of her mouth. Her heart rate goes fluttery again, her whole body melting into his arms despite her best efforts not to. His hand slides down her back, soft and skittering over the thin material of her t-shirt, running patterns up and down her spine. It occurs to her that she’s not exactly wearing an awful lot – not that he really seems to mind.

“Watch your hands,” she murmurs when they dip too low, but there’s a grin on her face she can’t suppress, especially when he quickly does as she asks, looking briefly concerned until he notices her smile. “I’m not doing this in my _kitchen_ , Ivan.”

“Doing what?” he asks innocently, ducking his head down to kiss her before she can huff out a reply.  She forgets what she was going to say anyway, all ideas of propriety and what, exactly, she didn’t want to do in her kitchen lost from her mind as he kisses her, his hands appropriately high and still shiver-inducing on her back and her waist and –

He lets one trail down to her leg, just below the hem of her shorts, where there’s nothing but bare skin all the way down for him to trace, and Kendall inhales sharply at the sensation. Ivan pauses to look at her curiously, questioningly – she knows he won’t do anything she doesn’t want him to, but that’s exactly the problem.

Belatedly, she whispers, “Doing this,” and hooks her legs up around his waist, her thighs sliding against his hips, leveraging herself up off the stool and into his arms. “Do I have to teach you the proper way to take a lady to bed, Sir Ivan?”

His eyes widen comically. “No,” he says quickly, adjusting his arms around her to keep her steady as she curls her hands into his hair and smiles down at him. “Not at all, my lady.”

Shelby is _never_ going to let her live this down, but Kendall thinks it’s a small price to pay, in the end.


End file.
